{"id":6882,"date":"2026-07-30T14:43:56","date_gmt":"2026-07-30T14:43:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/?p=6882"},"modified":"2026-07-30T14:43:56","modified_gmt":"2026-07-30T14:43:56","slug":"less-than-a-week-after-thinking-machines-cofounder-lilian-weng-resigned-citing-stress-and-illness-she-is-rejoining-sam-altman","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/?p=6882","title":{"rendered":"Less than a week after Thinking Machines cofounder Lilian Weng resigned citing stress and illness, she is rejoining Sam Altman"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<div class=\"e9jwa\">\n<div class=\"vdo_embedd\">\n<div class=\"GfdvZ\">\n<section class=\"_bIDB  clearfix id-r-component leadmedia undefined undefined  E9tg9 \" style=\"top:0px\">\n<div class=\"_bIDB\" data-ua-type=\"1\" onclick=\"stpPgtnAndPrvntDefault(event)\">\n<div class=\"ypVvZ\">\n<div class=\"WGttI\"><img src=\"https:\/\/static.toiimg.com\/thumb\/msid-132726298,imgsize-870762,width-400,height-225,resizemode-4\/open-ai.jpg\" alt=\"Less than a week after Thinking Machines cofounder Lilian Weng resigned citing stress and illness, she is rejoining Sam Altman\" decoding=\"async\" fetchpriority=\"high\"\/><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>Less than a week after announcing her resignation from Thinking Machines Lab citing stress and illness, cofounder Lilian Weng is now returning to work alongside <a href=\"https:\/\/timesofindia.indiatimes.com\/topic\/openai\" styleobj=\"[object Object]\" class=\"\" commonstate=\"[object Object]\" frmappuse=\"1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">OpenAI<\/a> CEO <a href=\"https:\/\/timesofindia.indiatimes.com\/topic\/sam-altman\" styleobj=\"[object Object]\" class=\"\" commonstate=\"[object Object]\" frmappuse=\"1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Sam Altman<\/a>. According to a report by Business Insider, Weng, who previously served as OpenAI\u2019s vice president of research and safety, said she had been ill more often in the past seven months than at any other point in her life.<!-- --> In her farewell post, she explained that the \u201cconsistent stress and workload\u201d of building a startup had pushed her beyond what her health could sustain.<span class=\"id-r-component br\" data-pos=\"7\"\/>Weng\u2019s departure came as Thinking Machines was sprinting to release its first open-weight model, Inkling. She admitted feeling \u201cguilt\u201d about taking sick leave during that critical period and considered narrowing her role before deciding to step away entirely. <!-- -->\u201cIf I cannot give it 100% for what I should be responsible for, I fail my job,\u201d she wrote. But just days later, Weng has chosen to rejoin Altman in a scoped role that promises more predictability and less strain than her cofounder responsibilities.<!-- --> A report by TechCrunch revealed that OpenAI has confirmed that Weng will be joining the company as the VP of AI Safety Research. <span class=\"id-r-component br\" data-pos=\"13\"\/>\u201cI&#8217;ve always been a curiosity-driven person. Leaning new knowledge or figuring out how to solve problems that are not well defined often gives me simple joy. The fun part of being a cofounder is how it &#8220;forced&#8221; me to develop new perspectives on company strategies, team building (at the company level), and much more, as well as how these seemingly abstract terms are deeply connected with our day-to-day actions, planning and narratives.<!-- --> With real-world experience, ideas that once felt theoretical become approachable and it is true for many terms in many domains,\u201d wrote Weng in a post on X.<span class=\"id-r-component br\" data-pos=\"19\"\/>Mira Murati the founder of Thinking Machines Lab thanked Weng for everything. \u201cWe\u2019ll miss you, it\u2019s been wonderful building Thinky together. I\u2019m glad that you\u2019re putting your health first. Thank you for everything.\u201d<span class=\"id-r-component br\" data-pos=\"21\"\/><\/p>\n<p><h2>Health challenges among AI leaders<br \/><\/h2>\n<\/p>\n<p>Her move follows a string of health-related step-backs across the AI industry. Earlier this month, Fidji Simo left her full-time role as OpenAI\u2019s CEO of AGI after a flare-up of POTS, while Greg Yang of xAI shifted into an advisory role after being diagnosed with Lyme disease. <!-- -->The pressures of leading frontier AI labs have increasingly highlighted the toll on executives\u2019 health.<span class=\"id-r-component br\" data-pos=\"27\"\/>Thinking Machines itself has been hit hard by Silicon Valley\u2019s AI talent war. A Business Insider review found that 13 of its 42 founding members have left since launch, including three of its six cofounders, as rivals like Meta and OpenAI offered lucrative compensation packages. Weng\u2019s return to Altman underscores how talent continues to circulate among the most influential players in AI.<span class=\"id-r-component br\" data-pos=\"29\"\/><\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/timesofindia.indiatimes.com\/technology\/tech-news\/less-than-a-week-after-thinking-machines-cofounder-lilian-weng-resigned-citing-stress-and-illness-she-is-rejoining-sam-altman\/articleshow\/132726248.cms\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Less than a week after announcing her resignation from Thinking Machines Lab citing stress and illness, cofounder Lilian Weng is now returning to work alongside OpenAI CEO Sam Altman. According to a report by Business Insider, Weng, who previously served as OpenAI\u2019s vice president of research and safety, said she had been ill more often [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1529,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6882","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-31"],"magazineBlocksPostFeaturedMedia":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/open-ai.jpg","medium":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/open-ai.jpg","medium_large":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/open-ai.jpg","large":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/open-ai.jpg","1536x1536":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/open-ai.jpg","2048x2048":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/open-ai.jpg","blogsy-small":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/open-ai.jpg","blogsy-small-tall":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/open-ai.jpg","blogsy-small-square":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/open-ai.jpg","blogsy-small-masonry":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/open-ai.jpg","blogsy-medium":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/open-ai.jpg","blogsy-medium-masonry":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/open-ai.jpg","blogsy-large":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/open-ai.jpg","blogsy-wide":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/open-ai.jpg"},"magazineBlocksPostAuthor":{"name":"admin","avatar":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/8709732a479614e7a8aa24d3eb1b239f30dc6d90c61464ed495001e7a469d856?s=96&d=mm&r=g"},"magazineBlocksPostCommentsNumber":"0","magazineBlocksPostExcerpt":"Less than a week after announcing her resignation from Thinking Machines Lab citing stress and illness, cofounder Lilian Weng is now returning to work alongside OpenAI CEO Sam Altman. According to a report by Business Insider, Weng, who previously served as OpenAI\u2019s vice president of research and safety, said she had been ill more often [&hellip;]","magazineBlocksPostCategories":["\u0b26\u0b47\u0b36 \u0b2c\u0b3f\u0b26\u0b47\u0b36"],"magazineBlocksPostViewCount":1,"magazineBlocksPostReadTime":3,"magazine_blocks_featured_image_url":{"full":["https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/open-ai.jpg",400,225,false],"medium":["https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/open-ai.jpg",300,169,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/open-ai.jpg",150,84,false]},"magazine_blocks_author":{"display_name":"admin","author_link":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/author\/admin"},"magazine_blocks_comment":0,"magazine_blocks_author_image":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/8709732a479614e7a8aa24d3eb1b239f30dc6d90c61464ed495001e7a469d856?s=96&d=mm&r=g","magazine_blocks_category":"<a href=\"#\" class=\"category-link category-link-31\">\u0b26\u0b47\u0b36 \u0b2c\u0b3f\u0b26\u0b47\u0b36<\/a>","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6882","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6882"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6882\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1529"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6882"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6882"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/koshalsambada.in\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6882"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}